365 days – One hundred adventures

I’m wrapping up this medieval romance story for work, and I can’t get one thought out of my head.

In Europe during the Middle Ages, actually up until the late 19th century, freshwater was unsafe to drink because the technology to purify it had yet to be developed.

Because of this, most people drank tea, coffee (after the 17th century), and what was known as “small beer”, a lightly fermented ale. And that was just for basic hydration, not to mention the wine, beer, and liquor they would have consumed recreationally.

So basically, everyone was mildly buzzed just..all the time.

At the same time, knowledge of medicine and anatomy were… let’s just say sketchy as best. So the understanding of the link between alcohol consumption and birth defects would have been completely unknown, as this connection wasn’t fully documented until friggin’ 1973.

Which begs the question, did any of the people that we picture from history suffer from some form of Fetal Alcohol Syndrome?

Note: I’m not trying to be insensitive on the subject, I’m just curious from a historical standpoint.